White Knight Chronicles Review - PS3

Game Description: In this fantasy RPG, you take control of a boy who comes into the possession of an ancient artifact. The artifact gives him the ability to transform into the White Knight of the title, a 7-meter warrior from a time when such creatures nearly destroyed all of civilization.

White Knight Chronicles Review

White Knight Chronicles delivers single player role-playing and online co-operative questing. Neither is pretty, but it gets the job done.

The Pros

Nifty customizable villages

Challenging online quests

Compelling crafting

The Cons

Dull-as-dirt plot, characters and design

Feature-rich social tools make co-op complicated

Your character takes a back seat to the hero

Level-5’s White Knight Chronicles straddles the line between single and multiplayer RPG, but doesn’t manage to accomplish the daring feat with anything close to resembling Jean Claude Van Damme-like prowess. This clumsy, bland and mostly uninspired role-player struggles to stretch both legs across the chasm of immersive solo questing and co-operative online play; however, the game splits its pants in the effort.

Princess Trouble

The game’s opening hours are rife with cliché. A princess is kidnapped by a sneering mustachioed villain and a foreboding evil knight in outlandish armor. The hero, Leonard (who looks like Ron Weasley in Lord of the Rings cosplay) decides to rescue the damsel even though his only adventuring experience came in the game’s first quest -- defending a wine shipment from monsters. White Knight Chronicles, predictably, unfolds as most JRPGs do: Leonard chases after his princess while meeting and recruiting adventurers to aid him in his journey.

Gameplay unfolds as follows: you and your crew hit a town, you talk to people until you’ve got an idea where to go and then you head there, entering a maze-like area where you have to claw your way past monsters to get from Point A to Point B. Combat is reminiscent of Final Fantasy XII, in the sense that you can see enemies before an encounter rather than getting blindsided by random encounters. You simply waltz over to them and start whacking away. However, your attacks are on a timer, so you can’t just button mash your way to victory. The game throws the requisite gear upgrades at you and gives you the ability to customize each character to a very fine degree. Also, points can be thrown into weapon and magic skills at will, making them extremely flexible.

Things get interesting when you realize that amidst all of this combat, you’re actually part of the supporting cast – the character you create at the beginning of the game is one of those adventurers recruited by Leonard. Having your hand-crafted character kept away from calling the shots as the game’s lead is weird at first, but later on, you discover why. Leonard eventually gains the ability to transform into a giant, super-powerful knight. The best way to navigate the game is to take Leonard’s reigns and allow your sidekick to offer support, so that the many giants, dragons and other hulking enemies between you and the end of the single player plot aren’t just gonna roll over for you.

Like Farmville With Boss Battles

At first, the fights in White Knight Chronicles feel overly simplistic, but the real-time brawls begin to bear fruit as the game progresses. Once you log into PSN, the combat becomes slightly more interesting. That’s because along the journey towards the game’s predictable ending, there are a bunch of side quests that players can tackle with friends. These fights accommodate up to four and throw difficult boss battles at players – go solo at the quest’s recommended level and you’ll surely die.

The player’s robust action bars (which feel mostly useless in the early game) make more sense when you’re playing with others, working to coordinate attacks, kick off custom combos and provide support spells. There’s a fairly complicated system of lobbies, chat rooms and message boards between the game’s main quest and its social side; however, the reward for engaging this online stuff is great. ??The coolest perk is the ability to build and customize your own village – a home base that generates supplies for you and provides a place to shop, craft and socialize with other players. Characters you encounter in towns and villages along your journey can be recruited to your town where they’ll work, buffing your burg’s ability to generate goodies and providing powerful motivation to chat up the mostly-boring NPCs who populate the castles, markets and villages you visit. If you don’t intend to play White Knight Chronicles online, you’re going to get a very different, weaker and even compromised experience. The single player story feels light and even unfinished without the interesting complications of online play.

Bland But Effective

Given Level-5’s pedigree with great titles like Dragon Quest VIII, Dark Cloud, and Jeanne D’Arc, White Knight Chronicles is a lukewarm effort from a developer that has done role-playing much better in the past. While their games aren’t always revolutionary, you can depend on them to feel unified and to nail the play and the plot. White Knight Chronicles doesn’t come close to capturing the triumphant hybridization and game-changing challenge we saw recently in games like Demon’s Souls. No, this game is too steeped in classic role-playing tropes to be that interesting. All of the game’s adherence to the JRPG scripture would be fine if the proceedings were imbued with even an ounce of originality. However, the game’s bland characters, world and plot betray an inherent cowardice. White Knight Chronicles has nothing new to say, so it hides within the spreadsheets and mechanics of role-play. It’s easy to get lost within those dungeons, becoming wrapped up in the grind of conquest and the diversions of crafting. Sometimes that kind of RPG busy work is more than enough to keep questers questing. In White Knight Chronicles, it’s just barely enough.

All I was looking for was a crappy dark cloud port at best if the gameplay like DC is there I'll pick it up but only when it's cheap adding the online quests and georama seems like it would be nice for me to play,I like level 5 and it wasnt the worst review thx G4

this game is incredible. i have seen so many mediocre reviews of WKC, but the game shines just below the surface. if you expect to turn on your PS3 and sperm your jeans it will not happen. but if you take the time to understand the game you will find maybe one of thee best ever combinations of a SP JRPG story with a fun in depth MP game.

the things that WKC does right, MANY different armor and weapon assets, incredible character customization that gives you 100% control and a fun combat system that you can forge combos in any way you want.

the game is the MOST underrated game of the last 10 years!!!

i cant believe a game like bioshock 2 floats on through review scores of 80%+ with such a tired system, and this game that has taken what we have loved on JRPGs in the past and evolved via western inspiration in a way that made me feel like japan's slump could be over if people take note of Level 5's diamond in the rough...

this game is incredible. i have seen so many mediocre reviews of WKC, but the game shines just below the surface. if you expect to turn on your PS3 and sperm your jeans it will not happen. but if you take the time to understand the game you will find maybe one of thee best ever combinations of a SP JRPG story with a fun in depth MP game.

the things that WKC does right, MANY different armor and weapon assets, incredible character customization that gives you 100% control and a fun combat system that you can forge combos in any way you want.

the game is the MOST underrated game of the last 10 years!!!

i cant believe a game like bioshock 2 floats on through review scores of 80%+ with such a tired system, and this game that has taken what we have loved on JRPGs in the past and evolved via western inspiration in a way that made me feel like japan's slump could be over if people take note of Level 5's diamond in the rough...

I got of tired of struggling as a Raven soldier in MAG so I picked this game up. I remember my friend being hyped about it coming to america a year ago. And to my surprise, it had a lot of things I liked in previous ps2 rpg games like .hack and FF. I'm still playing through the story and really enjoying it. I've probably put about 18 hours into the game so far. The menus for this game look great and are so easy to navigate I love it. Online is just sick. It's like the .hack online thing, only Its actually online =)

I'm sorry, but this is going to be my final fantasy this year. After seeing the FF XIII international video, I decided not to get it. So I say hey, I'd rather have a game where I can do and go wherever I want rather than follow a straight path in a "Good looking" game. I'd take game play over visuals any day!

I think I'm still going to pick this up because a bland story doesn't bother me, I like stories I've heard before with a small twist, it's almost like a modern age fairy tale anymore. The solo combat does sound unimpressive but a multiplayer rpg is the closest logical step to a console MMO

I am super shocked at this. You gave this the same score you gave Dante's Inferno and the review is hella different. You went into great detail why this game isn't that good and didn't really compare it to another game and if you did it was only a passing comment. This game sounds like a real 3 out of 5 and didin't seem worth even a rental from what I have read and seen so far. I am just confused. I guess I will go with instinct and get Dante's Inferno especially after reading this. Now I am sure the other review was a tad biased.

I've sunk in enough time to make it to lvl 30. The truth behind the matter is that it gets to be the same thing over and over. You just keep moving on to the next lvl and building up your Geo map. Spending all the cash you have to build the town. Then having to hunt down more item's to build up your town. It tends to get a bit boring in that aspect. It would have been better if your Avatar could have taken on the Knight's Ark. But the game has it good parts, but falls short in my eyes. Could have been so much more.

Wow..... I'm surprised to see all the low scores for this game. Picked it up on Wed. and have been hooked ever since, so much so I did not even really check any reviews till today. There is much to do, a fun online experience, and it flows very smoothly. I think this game is just unlucky enough to be swimming with some pretty big dogs these days, and if it had been a dead summer release I think it may have fared much better.

White Knight Chronicles is a pretty good RPG not great but good thought Im still waiting for a announcement for KINGDOM HEARTS 3!!! COMEON!!! ITS BEEN LIKE 3-4 Years since Kingom Hearts 2 CAME OUT! I WANT A 3RD ONE ALREADY!!! ANYONE ELSE AGREE?